Perhaps the greatest irony of the campaign last fall against Proposition 8 was how readily opponents of the initiative used the most hateful language to slur their opponents as haters. So self-righteous were they in their cause that they assumed that only those with malicious motives could support the measure.

In the course of the campaign, however, those promoting the proposition rarely attacked the opponents with the vehemence of those opponents used against them.

I was reminded of this at our GayPatriot dinner earlier this week. A reader (whom I had not previously met) joined us and recalled their rhetoric exactly as I had. He too reported how vicious opponents of the initiative had been, nearly bringing him (a young gay man) to vote in favor.

Yet, this reader’s words reminded me of my thoughts last fall when I voted against Prop 8. While I didn’t think it was appropriate for the state constitution to define marriage, I also didn’t want the haters to win. From all the hateful e-mails I received from the “No” side* and the speeches and conversations I heard, the hatred came primarily from the gay marriage side, those how like me, opposed the constitutional amendment.

I was no alone. In hist post on wavering before voting “No,” Wesley says he had wanted to “punish” those who had made an anti-Mormon ad (ostensibly to oppose 8). He too was offended by the rhetoric of Prop 8 opponents.

Later, at the height of the Carrie Prejean hullabaloo, he would write:

When [we] tell the opponents of gay marriage that they’re stereotyping all gays and lesbians and then label everyone on their side, from someone who would beat a 19-year-old to death for looking effeminate to someone who supports civil unions but not marriage, as “haters,” we lose. And when that stops being just a self-defeating political tactic and we actually start to believe that anyone who doesn’t meet us 100% of the way on this issue really is a “hater,” we lose again.

Now with Miss Prejean dethroned, it might become tempting to believe that tactics of intimidation do pay off. Perhaps they do pay off in an institution headquartered in deep “blue” enclaves of our nation and dominated by people from the cultural left.

But, to repeal Prop 8, it is necessary to win hearts and minds of people with attitudes different from those of the “cultural élite.” To that end, it is imperative that advocates of gay marriage move beyond the hate.

As I’ve said before (and undoubtedly will say again), we need acknowledge that some people can oppose gay marriage without hating gay people. We need to find out why those people are opposed to the social change gay marriage represents and find a means to take issue with their arguments without denigrating them as individuals.

——

*By contrast, the “Yes” side’s e-mails made sure to remind us that even if Prop 8 passed, the state’s landmark domestic partnership program would remain in place–something which the California Supreme Court affirmed when it upheld Prop 8.

30 Comments

After the CA supreme court upheld prop 8. I approached an influential person on the no on 8 campaign. I mentioned having changed my mind, yes for personal reasons, a gay son will do that to you.
I made the ‘mistake’ of mentioning that I would like to see something like wanting civil unions on the federal level.

The response I got back was: Civil unions for you too??

Needless to say, I’ll be sitting this fight out. If I am not pure enough for the No on 8ers, I have no idea who is.

Its about seperate but equal. And unfortunately marriage is the brand name that people take seriously. There are horror stores where people who have power of attorney or even domestic partnerships are not taken seriously when one partner is incompacitated.

The advertisement from the Courage Campaign about the LDS missionaries stealing the marriage licence from the lesbian couple called “Home Invasion” was actually true. They spent craploads of money to take away rights from gay and lesbian Californians.

I may be a conservative or a Republican, but I will honestly vote Libertarian or write in my own name if I have a hard core traditionalist on the ballot like Dennis Hollingsworth or Andrew Pughno on the ballot in California. I know California is screwed up hardcore, but Id not trade my rights and freedoms in exchange for fiscal responsiblity in California.

This is slightly off-topic, but surely I can’t be the only one who feels more than a little schadenfreude at the reactions of the gay left to the Obama administration’s defense of the DOMA. I got an e-mail yesterday from the local chapter of the Equal Rights Campaign whining about how the Obama administration had “stabbed us in the back” by strongly defending the DOMA in federal court. I thought it was quite funny. What did the gay left think Obama was going to do?

This is stupid. It doesn’t matter what the arguments are from the pro- or anti- side. What matters is the inherent merit of the issue itself. That’s the only thing that should be determining your vote. The anti-marriage side often makes the argument that our love is the equivalent of lusting for a horse, or even an inanimate object, and that if we grant to gay people marriage equality, we’ll have to grant it to people wanting to marry an animal or a rock. Is this not a hateful argument, GayPatriot? If arguments you disagree with coming from the pro-side motivate you to vote “no” on marriage equality, why do these arguments from the anti-side not provide a counterweight? Why are you so myopic?

I can tell you why I oppose the “social change gay marriage represents”. I oppose it because I see it as a campaign, NOT about equality for gays, but about destroying the Judeo-Christian moral foundation of this country.

Gay marriage is promoted by the same leftist socio-political crowd that, for more than a generation, has undermined real marriage and championed nearly all forms of “sexual freedom” out of its rabid hatred for traditional, Bible-based values. That crowd wants gay marriage so as to breach the bulwark holding back total libertinism. After all, you can’t support gay marriage AND oppose marriage for every other aberrant sex group and remain intellectually honest.

If gay marriage is legalized then 10, 15, or 20 years from now we’ll hear, “Why not legalize incestous marriage between consenting adults? People should be free to marry whomever they want. The same people who oppose incestuous marriage are the same bigots who opposed gay marriage years ago. The sky didn’t fall when society legalized gay marriage and it won’t fall when it legalizes incestuous marriage. There should be marriage equality for all.” Mark my words, that day is coming if gay marriage is passed.

If you don’t support full marriage equality for your son, then you don’t love him as much as you would if he were straight. “Love” means wanting the best for someone else. Marriage is better than civil unions.

Gays had my support on this topic but they have lost it. Honestly, I didn’t care if gays married or not. Life is too short for me to worry about what 2 strangers do in their bedroom so I supported it. After seeing the Prop 8 thuggery, threats, badgering and violence when they didn’t get their way, and the Prejean thing-forget it.

They, along with all gays that kept silent as the hooligans pulled their shenanigans-ya know what? up yours. You want my support but other than GP and Hillbuzz I did not see a single gay speak out against the fringe and what they did-anywhere. Perhaps amongst themselves they commented that they didn’t approve of the behavior but unless you read both those blogs every day, not one peep out of gays against the prop 9 thuggery. And there arent many that read daily blogs. Forget the internet, I saw not one single gay in my state speak up unless it was to promote thuggery

Simply put, those thugs turned my open mind into a closed one and the total silence by gays everywhere over it has tuned my yes vote into a no vote. You lost my support and the support of millions like me. The thugs only defined you 50%, it the rest of the gays that defined themselves with their silience the other 50%.

GP and Hillbuzz got lumped in with it even though they were vocal on their blogs about it

“In the course of the campaign, however, those promoting the proposition rarely attacked the opponents with the vehemence of those opponents used against them.”

That’ s because straight people do not manifest narcisstically hostile and borderline confrontational behaviors. At the core of the LGBT personality is that they are histrionic and passive-aggressive, regardless of their intellectual acumen.

esurience, I guess you are one of our new lower case commentors, and that is not a compliment.
Are you a parent??? How dare you try and define my love for my son under your standards!!!

You are clearly one of those haters, my way or the highway! And anyone who may think differently from me be damned.
Well add your voice to why I see this marriage equality fight as a mean spirited shove it down your throat campaign.

If you don’t support full marriage equality for your son, then you don’t love him as much as you would if he were straight.

This is simply an updated version of a child stamping their feet and screaming that “you don’t love me” because “you don’t give me whatever I want”.

I think Leah knows best what love for her children is, esurience. You are merely trying to blackmail her by taking her child hostage to push your leftist hate agenda and force her to do your bidding.

Pigs like yourself serve a use, though; they shame and humiliate anyone who would dare support leftists like you. No wonder the Obama administration is now comparing leftist gays like you to incest practitioners and arguing that gays should be kept out of marriage; you make it easy and obvious to demonstrate why.

The anti-marriage side often makes the argument that our love is the equivalent of lusting for a horse, or even an inanimate object, and that if we grant to gay people marriage equality, we’ll have to grant it to people wanting to marry an animal or a rock. Is this not a hateful argument, GayPatriot?

Frankly, I don’t see it as “hateful” at all. What’s more, nobody says (to my knowledge) that it’s the “equivalent of”, but rather if we allow one, we have to allow the other. But you know what? I’ve never heard a convincing argument against that line of reasoning other than “nuh-uh!”. I should think someone would have come up with something more thoughtful by now.

If you don’t support full marriage equality for your son, then you don’t love him as much as you would if he were straight.

Well damn, E-surance. That’s no way to get Leah to agree with her. Besides, looking at kids today, it doesn’t seem like liberals love kids all that much. Throw the liberal infanticide of tens of millions of kids and I think one could conclude that liberals love kids like OJ loved Nicole.

I’m not gay, but I do have some thoughts on this and since I am an active voter, someone may care. I am about as conservative as you can get. I have many relatives from the Midwest who are also very conservative, religious and uber-patriotic. You’d expect that with all the bad press that we (religious-family value-Midwest conservatives) get from the media that we’d all be anti gay-marriage, but I’m telling you that it just isn’t so. I don’t want to talk for this whole group, but my impression is that they want exactly what you want, and that is not to have someone forcing an outside moral agenda on them. Most of the small town people where I’m from could really care less if “those gays” want to marry or not. I know its part of your everyday world, but there are relatively few openly gay people in my life. So why would my anyone vote against gay marriage? I think that the more radical and vocal members of the gay community have stepped over the line and have scared people into thinking that once they get a foothold, that they will force some radical gay agenda on everyone whether they like it or not. I think that Perez Hilton has hurt the gay community more than anyone can possibly imagine.

Id not trade my rights and freedoms in exchange for fiscal responsiblity in California

considering marriage gives you nothing that you cant already do on your own other than make you eligible for government entitlements, whereas fiscal irresponsibility takes away your rights and freedoms….you just have traded them away.

I’m indifferent to Gay Marriage, I know a fair few homosexuals (some of them fetishers) of all stripes, and some are homosensual, while still heterosexual(homosexual tendencies while still prefering heterosexual intercourse)

My only thing about my opposition to gay marriage, has nothing to do with gay marriage. It has EVERYTHING to do with process

I’m personally of the opinion that marriage is about procreation, but since the state has been involved in the marriage as merger contract crap, I see no reason to exclude gays.

In my life, there is only one woman I will ever marry, and if she doesn’t want children, I will never marry her.

but I’m a guy who actually has standards based on basic values, I was a Marine, but I don’t think anyone who WANTS to be a Marine can say they were, just cuz “it’s just words.”

You earn it, you give it value, words have value, and meaning, and If I can’t marry the woman I love because she doesn’t want children, because I think words mean a thing, why should the courts give gays the right to engage in a farce?

That is what it is, it’s a farce, gay marriage, for the most part, isn’t meant to build lasting bonds, it’s to attack the foundations of existing lasting bonds.

It won’t “destroy” “traditional” marriage, but it will say to those who have a “traditional marriage” that their marriage is meaningless, and their children aren’t theres, their “commitment” is only a game of words.

Marriage is not that, it is something special, and while I understand that a man could love another man, and a woman could love another woman, but it doesn’t change the fact that you basically have to . . .

sorry, I lack a lesser more kind word.

STEAL another persons child to build a family.

Love who you please, but you can’t create fundamentally as we were made, and THAT is why I oppose gay marriage.

YET!
YET!!!!

If gay marriage is passed through the legislature, and with the support of the people? YAY

But I agree with you, an ammendment is overkill, but then again, a single judgement is a bridge too far.

I oppose it because I see it as a campaign, NOT about equality for gays, but about destroying the Judeo-Christian moral foundation of this country.

Seane-Anna, so you would be more supportive of same sex marriage if it was about equality for gays, and not about (as you see it) destroying the Judeo-Christian moral foundation of this country? Or do you see same sex marriage as destroying the Judeo-Christian moral foundation of this country.

If you don’t support full marriage equality for your son, then you don’t love him as much as you would if he were straight.

Esuriance, I do think that is an unfair characterization here for many reasons. First of all, Leah does want the same for her children, which is more than we can say for still too many parents who cannot accept their child’s sexuality, or even worse, accept their children. Second, I think Leah’s support for federal civil unions, at this point, is practical. Like it or not, federally recognized marriage is not happening anytime soon. We have a president who says he supports federally recognized civil unions (although, unfortunately is so far, backtracking on most of his promises for gay equality), so this is a great place to start. With such in place, then people in MA, NH, IA, VT, CT, ME, and soon in CA and NJ, will not only have same sex marriage, but also the same rights and benefits as any married couple. Anyway, you should apologize to Leah for that comment.

Gay Marriage, if it is to be, should be through the legislature, not the courts.

Douglas, I’ll agree with you there. But…

sorry, I lack a lesser more kind word.

STEAL another persons child to build a family.

Putting aside the way you are phrasing (I’m assuming) adoption, are you saying that the ideal of marriage is the following. That it should be limited to those who can and will procreate. That’s it. So besides same sex couples, who obviously cannot procreate. But also, opposite sex couples who cannot procreate or do not want to procreate, including those who want to adopt children. Furthermore, some couples like to wait a number of years before they have children. They should wait until they are ready.

But you know what? I’ve never heard a convincing argument against that line of reasoning other than “nuh-uh!”. I should think someone would have come up with something more thoughtful by now.

And I’m not going to provide one here, TGC. If you want to know when the slippery slope began, I suppose when marriage became part of society, and we had laws to recognize them. Marriage has changed since it first started. It is no longer limited to people within the same classes, less of them are arranged now, women are no longer considered property, not limited to people of the same race, etc. All of these changes, even the ones that are, IMO, as fundamental as the genders involved, happened on their own merits. I’m sure there were people who argued, “well if we don’t treat women as chattel in a marriage, then…”

So same sex marriage should be argued on its own merits. Will it lead to polygamy or marriage to rocks? I hope not. Whereas, I believe that there are compelling arguments for same sex marriage, I don’t believe the same is the case for the other two. I say, let them make their case. I don’t believe they can.

Matt – you wrote LDS missionaries stealing the marriage licence from the lesbian couple called “Home Invasion” was actually true. Really? Was a police report filed? Home invasion is a serious felony.

That ad nearly changed my vote on prop 8 – so offensive was it. Given that I strongly favor marriage for gays, that’s saying something. I suspect that a lot of people on the fence were offended as well.

Thinking that marriage is between a man and a woman is hardly controversial. It is a foundation of western civilization and has proven successful for a long time. As such, it is up to us to make the case (and there is a good one) that this institution be changed. That is what legislatures are for.

If this is done through the courts then there really is no reason for the courts to uphold laws against bigamy, incest, and all the rest (any lawyers care to comment?).

Gosh, religious social conservatives are such shrinking violets. Did they think that their efforts to override the constitutional rights of a visible minority in order to impose their religious beliefs on others would be greeted with “love and understanding?”

Would they accept a majoritarian effort to have Mormonism classified as a “cult” instead of a “legitimate religion” as A-OK?

Seriously, the right wing has a victim complex the size of Mount Everest.

“I tried to take away your rights and deny your humanity and dignity under the law, and you had to be HATEFUL in your response!”

It’s like the guy who punches someone else, only to realize that the guy he punched is twice his size and knows judo… “now, now, no need to get violent!”

I hate all this hate stuff. The whole business of hate crimes and hate speech and the creation of the new political creature, the hater….it’s all PC BS. And like all PC BS, it’s designed to have us anxiously monitor our thoughts and feelings so that we follow the left line.

Hating is a part of life, especially of political life. It is, in fact, necessary for survival. Being against hate is like being against war or anything else that is part of the human phenomenon. The preening moralism that proscribes strong negative and personal reactions as “hating” and therefore by definition excluded…it’s just a rhetorical game.

I hate the Jihad and any Muslim who supports or takes part in it. I hated Communism and anyone who professes Communism I will hate. What I am unimpressed by, for example, is lingo from the HRC and friends about Love Conquering Hate…and the transformation of every opponent of gay marriage into a “hater”. It’s moralizing PC BS. And I hate it.

Brian, the majority of the people in California voted prop 8 through. So you’re now saying ‘the religious right’ is a majority? Falwell will be so proud.

And government recognition of marriage is not a ‘right’ say it with me. The court, you know the same supreme court who pulled the ‘right’ out of the aether agreed the same thing with their upholding of prop 8. So now the California Supreme Court is part of the ‘Religious Right’?

Please show where this mythical ‘denying of humanity and dignity’ came from. Do you mean the comercial showing Mormons ransacking a couple’s home? Or maybe you mean the assault on the little old lady.

*yawn* Come back when you have actually something new to say, little boy.

In fact, I challenge you to do it. Go ahead and show the world how gays hate religion and seek to ban it publicly. Go on, practice your “principles”.

NDT, actually, this isn’t about gays hating religion. Maybe Brian Miller does, so need to project his views onto the rest of us. Further, it’s not just anti-religious who think Mormonism is a cult (in fact, they may regard all religions as cults), but many religious persons view the LDS Church as a cult and/or non-Christian, and may support Brian’s suggestion. They may be a minority, but not a “tiny, tiny” one.

Pat, while your rationalizations of idiocy are heartwarming from a standpoint of loyalty to one’s minority status, they also are doing little more than reinforcing in the minds of said idiots that they can do whatever they want and the gay community will pop up to make excuses for them.

I’d rather just call out Brian Miller as an antireligious bigot who tries to hide behind being gay as an excuse.

“What’s the difference between a religion and a cult?” “About 2,000 years.”

Even if we conceed Mormons are a ‘cult’ (I don’t, but I admit some do) they aren’t harming anyone, and are pretty decent members of society.

Plus, they have a) the right to believe as they see fit, provided they follow the laws of the country; and b) they retain all the rights and responcibilities of citizens, including the right to lobby the government and to affect legislation.

Now if only we could turn our guns on the more enjoyable targets, like Scientologists for example

If you stopped there, I wouldn’t have commented. But you projected your view of Brian Miller as an antireligious bigot onto gay persons as a whole.

who tries to hide behind being gay as an excuse.

I can’t read a person’s mind, so I have no way of knowing for sure. But I didn’t see Brian Miller using being gay as an excuse regarding his views on religion. Besides, he didn’t have to. Plenty of straight people are anti-religious as well.

Pat, while your rationalizations of idiocy are heartwarming from a standpoint of loyalty to one’s minority status, they also are doing little more than reinforcing in the minds of said idiots that they can do whatever they want and the gay community will pop up to make excuses for them.

NDT, I’m not rationalizing anyone’s anti-Mormon bigotry. Just pointing out that it’s not just gay people and not just anti-religious persons. You, on the other hand, were selective in criticizing all gays based on one person’s comment. And for some reason didn’t bother to point out that religious persons also think as Mormons as a cult, and chose to ignore that point when I brought it up.

“What’s the difference between a religion and a cult?” “About 2,000 years.”

Good one, Livewire. I normally don’t get insights from South Park, but I have to say the Mormon episode did, and helped me appreciate that joke more.

Even if we conceed Mormons are a ‘cult’ (I don’t, but I admit some do) they aren’t harming anyone, and are pretty decent members of society.

Plus, they have a) the right to believe as they see fit, provided they follow the laws of the country; and b) they retain all the rights and responcibilities of citizens, including the right to lobby the government and to affect legislation.

Agreed. And to be clear, I don’t view the Church of LDS a cult either.